Newtown CT, Sandy Hook Elementry School: Honoring

Words from Newtown's leaders:
 "The best way to honor what happened to the youngsters and loved ones who lost their lives here on December 14, is to take care of someone in your own community," 
 First Selectman Mrs Llodra replied. "The concept of paying it forward is real. It has the power and potential to do some good in a really sustainable way."

It is hard to imagine that one year has passed, hard to imagine still that it happened at all. Harder still to realize that the breaking news on the eve of the first anniversary of Sandy Hook murders in a quiet community of children centered around a school in Colorado only miles away from Columbine where a shooter lay dead in a school where it could have happened all over again with high school students.

My heart surrounds the communities of Newtown, the parents, siblings, grandparents and all there this winter morning as we remember them, honor their pain, their desire for us to pause and remember.

The teens of  the Jr. Newtown Action Alliance launched the "Green Post it Project" as a campaign of kindness to honor the one year mark of the #SandyHook School shooting. The community has joined in. Today there are probably acts of kindness spreading across that community marked by GREEN POST IT NOTES everywhere. Perhaps post it notes have spread across the world with acts of conscious kindness taking place to honor the victims, the survivors, the ones who have gotten up, put on their clothes and walked out their doors with intention, hope, courage, faith as their angels walk with them.

Newtown CT. has been a community flooded with others since this tragedy, has been a community that has stood in the face of horror. They have not let horror turn them bitter, however they have become strong in movement. From their homes to the White House they have moved in advocacy for gun measures, violence to mental health issues. Their teens have become walking advocates for change right beside parents who have stood in the face of grief personified as strangers have walked into their communities and into their spaces.

Today they have asked for the world to "pay it forward" in kindness in their "own" communities, their own ways and they continue to believe that "Love Wins" as they remember their little ones and those educators who died protecting them. They continue to let their voices be heard and will stand on issues that have changed their lives forever more.

We as a Nation continue to see things, hear things that horrify us as individuals while wondering what has happened to the moral fiber of life and those who pick up weapons walking into a school, a parking lot, a Walmart and taking the life of another so easily.  The number of deaths by guns/weapons involving children since last year are staggering. Close to 200 including kids who picked up a gun that was loaded and didn't know.
But what happened/is happening in schools? That is more than most minds can grasp... Sandy Hook the second deadliest Murder in history in a school of little ones.

Today, the call is for KINDNESS... to pay it forward. How wonderful that the call has come from teenagers of Newtown. Kids who have gone through the hell of pain of loss. Many of whom have stood on the steps of change, wanting something better to come from such tragedy. 

I hope you will join me in whatever way you can as we remember them today.


We as a Nation, as individuals must ramp up our KINDNESS factor, our ability to say no more, and so much more in the ability to care while stepping up the game of caring for each other.

We Remember Sandy Hook and those precious lives, gone too soon. May those there today find the love of the world surrounding them in all ways that are comforting.

Sandy Hook Elementary School

in memory and prayers:

  Charlotte Bacon, 2/22/06, female
- Daniel Barden, 9/25/05, male
- Rachel Davino, 7/17/83, female.
- Olivia Engel, 7/18/06, female
- Josephine Gay, 12/11/05, female
- Ana M. Marquez-Greene, 04/04/06, female
- Dylan Hockley, 3/8/06, male
- Dawn Hochsprung, 06/28/65, female
- Madeleine F. Hsu, 7/10/06, female
- Catherine V. Hubbard, 6/08/06, female
- Chase Kowalski, 10/31/05, male
- Jesse Lewis, 6/30/06, male
- James Mattioli , 3/22/06, male
- Grace McDonnell, 12/04/05, female
- Anne Marie Murphy, 07/25/60, female
- Emilie Parker, 5/12/06, female
- Jack Pinto, 5/06/06, male
- Noah Pozner, 11/20/06, male
- Caroline Previdi, 9/07/06, female
- Jessica Rekos, 5/10/06, female
- Avielle Richman, 10/17/06, female
- Lauren Rousseau, 6/1982, female (full date of birth not specified)
- Mary Sherlach, 2/11/56, female
- Victoria Soto, 11/04/85, female
- Benjamin Wheeler, 9/12/06, male
- Allison N. Wyatt, 7/03/06, female

We are with you Newtown, in thoughts, prayers and Kindness. Love wins... may you each feel the power of your angels always...

Walk in beauty,
DRSES